She carefully turned Maddie over.

“Oh my God,” she said. “I’ve killed the baby.”

Cat didn’t look up from her magazine. “Well, Lyn’s going to be really mad at you.”

“Cat! I’m not joking!”

Cat threw aside the magazine and bounced to her feet. Together they stared at Maddie’s flushed, creased face. Cat poked her gently in the stomach. The baby didn’t move. Gemma pressed her hand to her mouth. “What have I done?”

Cat poked again, harder—and Maddie’s face crumpled as she erupted into a scream of rage. Cat picked her up and began to jiggle her. “Yes, I know, darling, we won’t let that murderous Auntie Gemma hold you anymore.”

It had been the most terrifying moment of Gemma’s life.

“Gem! Gem! Oh! Gem!”

Gemma looked up to see Maddie running through the coffee shop to her, followed by Lyn pushing an empty stroller. Maddie was wearing blue denim overalls and a gaudy pink and silver tiara in her hair. Gemma had bought her the Little Princess tiara, secretly coveting it for herself.

“Over there! Gem!” called Maddie to the little boy at the next table as she went running by, pointing her out, as if to say, Are you mad? How could you have missed seeing this extraordinary person sitting right next to you!

Gemma swooped her onto her lap, and Maddie placed both her tiny starfish hands firmly on Gemma’s cheeks and immediately launched into an incomprensible story.

Lyn remained standing, clutching the stroller handles. “What’s the matter?” she demanded.

“What do you mean?” asked Gemma, turning her head and letting Maddie turn it back again.

“Why are you so early? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong! Why are you so late?”

“I’m not,” Lyn maneuvered the stroller out of the way and sat down. “I’m right on the dot. We always tell you a time half an hour earlier than the actual time.”

“Your Auntie Gemma is typecast,” Gemma told Maddie. “Just like Meg Ryan. That’s why nobody believed she was a brain surgeon in that movie.”

“City of Angels,” said Lyn. “Shocking movie. Michael and I walked out of it.”

“Nobody would believe I was a brain surgeon either.”

“Probably not. You’d keep dropping your instruments.”

“I think I would make an excellent surgeon. I’d be very calm and cool.”

“You’ve got something on your cheek. Mascara, maybe.” Lyn licked her finger and reached over for Gemma’s cheek.

Gemma recoiled. “I’ll do it myself!”

“It’s only saliva. When you become a brain surgeon, you’ll have to touch mushy, bloody brains.”

“Dirty,” said Maddie sympathetically. She put her own finger into her mouth and began to rub away at Gemma’s cheek.

“Where’s the waitress?” Lyn swung around in her chair and tapped her fingers on the tabletop. “I need caffeine to help me cope with Cat. This is the first time I’ve seen her since the Dan thing.”

“Oh yes! I knew there was something I was looking forward to! The biggest family scoop of all time.”

“Stop it, please. It was a long time ago. I can hardly remember it.”

“Oh, come on. Explain yourself. I don’t get it. Why didn’t you just tell her at the time?”

Lyn pushed her hair back behind her ears and leaned forward with her elbows on the table.

“Why didn’t he just tell her is more to the point! I was on the other side of the world. By the time I got back they’d already been seeing each other for months. Obviously I should have said it right away. But she was so happy and they were all over each other, remember? It seemed cruel to say, Oh by the way, I dated him too. And besides—”

“Yes?” said Gemma benevolently. She was feeling especially affectionate toward Lyn today, she looked so uncharacteristically uncertain.

“I never thought it would last. I didn’t think Dan was the commitment type. Every week I expected it to end. Next thing you know, you and I are both walking down the aisle in purple taffeta.”

“And why didn’t you tell me?”

“You?” Lyn looked at her with disbelief. “You can’t keep a secret.”

Gemma’s affection levels plummeted. “That is so not true!”

“That is so not true,” repeated Lyn thoughtfully. “You talk like a fifteen-year-old. Kara says that. That is so not true, Lyn, I do pick up my own washing.”

Gemma gritted her teeth and went back on the attack. “So, did you sleep with Cat’s husband too?”

“Gemma! He wasn’t Cat’s husband at the time.”

“Did you?”

“What if I did?’

“Nothing if you did. I’m just wondering. Did you?”

“I lost my virginity to him.”

“You didn’t!” Gemma allowed Maddie to slither from her lap. “Your first time was with Hank in Spain!”

“Well, it wasn’t.”

“But it was!”

“I guess I might be just a little more qualified to speak on the subject.”

“I can’t believe it.”

Gemma and Lyn watched Maddie trot over to the little boy at the next table and put her face right up close to his so their noses were practically touching.

“So.” Gemma didn’t look at Lyn. “Dan, hey? Any good?”